


In the Shrike's Nest

by Damonfreak89, nephila_clavipes



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Amnesia, Angst, Cannibalism, Cannibalistic Thoughts, Child Death, Crime Fighting, Emotional Manipulation, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Mind Games, Mind Manipulation, Murder, Murder Husbands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-06-06
Packaged: 2020-04-11 22:10:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19118689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Damonfreak89/pseuds/Damonfreak89, https://archiveofourown.org/users/nephila_clavipes/pseuds/nephila_clavipes
Summary: Haunted by nightmares of murdering his former Alpha, Garret Jacob Hobbs, Will Graham struggles to know the difference between the past and the present. Can his new Alpha, Hannibal Lecter, help, or is he making things worse?Submission for Hannigram A/B/O Big Bang 2019. Amazing art created by Nephila-clavipes





	In the Shrike's Nest

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone,
> 
> So, this is my short story submission... I hope you like it! It was definitely a challenge keeping to 5,000 words!!! I hope I've captured enough of Will's emotional pain and his relationship with Hannibal. 
> 
> Rated Mature as there's no sex in this piece - there was no time!!!

 

Her throat splits so easily…

With a strangled yell, Will Graham throws himself out of bed, staggering towards the bathroom as he fights off swarms of dark, biting flies.

‘I’ll make it stop!’ he gasps, fumbling for the light switch, leaving red handprints smeared on the walls, wincing when the bulb flares bright. ‘I’m _sorry!_ God, I’ll make it stop… I’ll make it all go away…’

The light reveals the scene in all its horror and Will stares, his heart racing, chest heaving. There’s blood _everywhere_ ; he slips in it, falling into the sink and spraying crimson across the mirror, the cabinets, even the _walls_.

How can one person lose so much blood?

_See?_

His arm aches. Looking down, Will sees that he’s clutching his hunting knife, his grip so tight it turns his knuckles as white as the bone from which it’s made. He tries to drop it, tries to throw it away from him, but he _can’t_ … He can’t stop; he can’t make it end, and there is so much _blood_ …

‘Will…?’

A soft voice cuts through the rising panic, soothing as rain on fire, and Will turns. He squints, trying to focus, trying to see past the haze coating his eyes. There’s a figure in the doorway, blurred and indistinct, but achingly familiar.

_Alpha…_

‘Garret?’

Having woken to an elbow in the gut and the stink of terror rising from his Omega, Hannibal Lecter had followed Will to the bathroom, watching the other man fall at the sink, his movements wild and uncoordinated, clearly horrified by things only he could see. He frowns when Will claws at his own hand, trying to pry open the fingers of his empty fist, his breath coming in ever more shallow pants.

Calling to him, gentle enough that it won’t wake him with a start, Hannibal feels a flicker of hope at the look of relief on Will’s face. But the Omega’s golden eyes are wide and sightless, and the quavering voice speaks to a man long dead.

_Garret?_

Hannibal tries again, taking a step closer and reaching for his mate.

‘Will, you’re having a nightmare. Come back to me.’

_Stay with me. Honor me._

Garret Jacob Hobbs holds out a rotting hand, his milky eyes boring holes into Will’s throbbing skull. His Alpha’s skin is pale, too long in the ground, and Will can see the grinning curve of his jaw through the missing flesh of his cheek.

_I bit you hard_.

‘I’m sorry,’ he gasps, tears falling thick and fast as he backs away, holding the knife up to shield himself. ‘I’m _sorry_.’

‘Will!’

Hannibal lunges for him, just as Will’s knees hit the edge of the bathtub. The Omega topples, falling with a yell, and Hannibal grabs him by the front of his t-shirt. He yanks Will close, hugging him tight to his chest and enfolding his thrashing arms with one hand, squeezing the nape of his neck with the other.

‘NO!’ Will’s legs give out as the Alpha applies pressure to the nerves in his neck, flooding his body with endorphins. He sinks to the bathmat, still held by the dead man, his struggles getting weaker with every pinch and stroke of clever thumbs. He folds himself into the embrace, even as he shivers and whines for mercy. ‘Alpha, please… I’m _sorry_.’

‘Sssh…’ Hannibal rocks his mate back and forth, pressing kisses to sweat-dark curls and releasing Will’s arms to stroke up and down his shoulders. He keeps the pressure on his Omega’s crest, his palm covering the raised ridge of scar tissue. The nerves are more sensitive there, and Will’s eyelids begin to droop under the continued manipulation.

‘Come back to me,’ Hannibal murmurs, pressing the words into Will’s temple, nuzzling the stubble on his cheeks and nudging his jawline to scent the fluttering pulse beneath. ‘I’m here, _mylimasis._ Stay with me.’

Will hears his voice, as quiet as a cry in the wind. He tries to turn towards it, the dream dissolving into exhausted confusion and, as he does, he realizes he’s cold. His bare legs are numb from the awkward position on the bathroom floor, his back is aching and his palm stings where his nails have cut bloody half-moons into the skin.

‘H-Hannibal?’

At Will’s hesitant croak, Hannibal’s purr fills the room. He releases Will’s crest and cradles him in his arms, allowing the smaller man to turn and look up at him.

‘I… I don’t remember,’ Will mutters, brows furrowed and mouth turned down in an unhappy grimace. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘I’m fine,’ Hannibal promises, dipping his head to kiss Will’s dry, bitten lips. ‘It was just a dream.’

‘I don’t _remember_ ,’ Will repeats, a little louder this time. A little too defiant, but Hannibal allows the lie, already knowing what the night terror had been about.

_You tore his throat out. Your first Alpha._

‘Let me clean your hand,’ he says, lifting Will’s bruised and bloody palm for inspection. Will sits quietly in his arms, weary from terror and still pliant from the Gentling, watching absently as Hannibal dips his mouth to the wounds and begins to lick them, cleaning off the blood in long, rasping strokes, coating them in his saliva to numb the pain and heal them.

_I should honor you…_

‘W’time is it?’ he mumbles, flexing his fingers and rotating his wrist when Hannibal releases him. He doesn’t try to get up just yet; he isn’t sure his legs could support him, and Hannibal seems content to stay with him on the tiles. A little longer in their haven, pretending nothing has happened… A little longer before he has to go to bed, only to wake and return to work.

‘A little past three,’ Hannibal replies, now attempting to tidy Will’s mess of dark curls. He pushes them back from gaunt cheeks and a sticky brow, reaching behind himself for a cloth from the sink. With only a little jostling, he manages to wet the washcloth with cold water, wiping away the drying sweat and tears caking his Omega’s face.

‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ Will says, anticipating Hannibal’s next offer. He takes the cloth from his mate and rubs the back of his neck, wincing when the rough flannel scratches his crest. Tosses it into the laundry hamper beside them and shifts, getting his feet under him. ‘Can we just… go back to sleep?’

‘Of course.’ Hannibal rises and helps Will up, holding him close as the smaller man stretches out the knots from his back and shoulders. ‘Would you like me to bring the dogs up?’

‘You don’t mind?’ Will’s heart tightens and he turns hopeful eyes on his Alpha, leaning into him when Hannibal nods his promise to fetch their pets. Under normal circumstances, the dogs sleep in their own room beside the pantry, but whenever Will has a night terror, Hannibal permits the animals upstairs.

‘I’ll get them now,’ he says, guiding Will to return to bed. ‘Rest. I won’t be long.’

Will nods, his eyelids already drooping and head swimming as sleep steals back over him. The mattress dips under his weight and he feels Hannibal ease his head down onto his pillow. He purrs, cradled in their mingled scents, safe and warm and cherished, and feels the soft brush of lips on his temple before his eyes slide shut.

Hannibal drapes the quilt back over his sleeping mate, tucking it around him so that he’ll feel secure until he returns.

‘Sleep well, _mylimasis_ ,’ he whispers, gazing down at his beloved. At the innocent face, which hides so many dark secrets. So much _potential._ ‘I’ll be back soon.’

***

‘Minneapolis Homicide’s calling him the “Minnesota Shrike”.’

Will frowns at Jack Crawford’s words, dread twisting his gut into cramps. He’s heard this before… _Seen_ this before… The stag’s head, stolen a few days before… The body of Cassie Boyle, impaled in an expression of exquisite agony, her lungs torn from her still-living chest…

‘Like the bird?’ he mutters, swallowing bile when the Alpha gives him a very peculiar look.

_Where did all his love go?_

‘Er, _yeah_ …’ It’s not Jack who speaks, but Brian Zeller. ‘Endangered songbirds… Like the _bird_.’

The Crime Scene Investigator raises his dark eyebrows and shakes his head at his colleague. Jimmy Price, chainsaw still in his latex-gloved hands, simply shrugs at the unusual response to his announcement about their latest Chesapeake Ripper victim – Councilor Sheldon Isley. He’s used to Will by now. Zeller, it seems, never will be.

Jack’s irises flash red and he steps closer, shielding the Omega from the curious gazes of the two Betas.

‘Will, are you feeling alright?’ he asks quietly, his scent sharpening with worry as he takes stock of the pale skin, bitten lips and shadowed eyes. Will might be bonded to Dr Lecter, but during the working day, when he’s consulting for the BAU, he is _his_ responsibility.

Will’s heart skips a beat and then begins to knock double-time against his ribs. Does Jack know? Can he smell the blood on him? It had soaked right through to his bones… Right into his soul…

Some stains could never be removed.

‘You said yourself; what you do is not good for you…’

Hannibal’s voice, so low it’s barely heard… Will turns towards it, seeking his mate, but cold emptiness greets him. Hannibal is at his office. Hannibal had dropped him off this morning and left him…

He’s alone.

_Do you see?_

‘Um…’ Will rubs at the sweat on his forehead, the plaid cotton of his shirt clinging to his back. He shivers, his fingers tingling as he reaches for the hunting knife at his belt. He pauses, thinking better of it. ‘I’m, er… I’m just tired,’ he mumbles, nodding to himself and to Jack, as if that will convince him. ‘Didn’t sleep well.’

‘Look, Will, I know Hannibal signed you off to work, but if it’s too soon for you –’

‘I just want to get back to normal,’ Will says, and Jack sighs.

‘It’s never gonna _be_ normal, Will. You had a break. You were _hospitalized_. I get it; the Muralist was a really shitty case, but –’

‘But it was too much for me,’ Will finishes, shame forming a lump in his throat. ‘I got… confused.’

_GARRET! NO!_

He shudders, salty fear seeping from his pores, strong enough to make Jack’s eyes flash crimson. The hunting knife hangs, heavy and potent, at his belt, and Will’s fingers _itch_ to pull it free.

‘I get it,’ the Alpha says gently. ‘It affected me, too. Just remember; _this_ isn’t _that_.’

_This isn’t the Shrike… The unsolved case… The killer that suddenly stopped._

Will’s blood turns to sludge in his veins and he forcibly turns back to the latest Ripper tableau, effectively ending the conversation with Jack. The Head of Behavioral Sciences narrows his eyes in final consideration, weighing up the risks and benefits of having Will hunt the Chesapeake Ripper, even in his current condition, and then nods.

‘Alright.’ He turns back to Zeller and Price. ‘Carry on.’

Zeller removes his goggles and picks up his clipboard.

‘Autopsy report gave us what you’d expect from a Ripper victim,’ he says, reading through the list of wounds. ‘Pre-mortem surgical dissection, latex glove impressions… body was posed before rigor set in.’

_I sowed the seeds…_

Will shivers, gazing up at the masterpiece, the creation of blood and flesh and flowers… It’s beautiful. Like a painting, each brushstroke has purpose. Meaning.

_I cultivated a long chain of events, leading to that day…_

Blinking, he sees not the BSU lab but his old kitchen, in the house he shared with Garret. The afternoon sun slants down through the windows, bathing the room in gold, and the nostalgia makes his throat hurt with misery.

It shouldn’t be so pretty. It shouldn’t be so peaceful.

_It won’t stay peaceful for long…_

‘Garret! Abigail!’

Will bursts through the front door, his heart racing, chest trapped in a vice as panic skids around his brain. He smells Alpha pheromones; the distinctive tang of Rut hormones as Garret works himself into a frenzy… The salty stink of fear, tainted with Abigail’s sweet Omegan musk…

‘GARRET! NO!’

_Not Abi… Not her… Not my little girl…_

It’s all he can think. All he _knows_. Will can sense Dr Lecter behind him, keeping pace but giving him free rein, letting him lead the way down the hallway and into the kitchen.

‘I’m here for you, Will, but this is _your_ fight. You need to see for yourself. To know.’

Hannibal had said that on the drive over here. Will had been panicking, dizzy with denial that Garret, _his_ Garret, his Alpha, could be the one responsible for all those deaths… That his _mate_ since high school could be the Minnesota Shrike…

That _his_ daughter could be in danger.

‘It could be a coincidence,’ he’d muttered, _kept muttering_ , even as he’d gripped the steering wheel tight enough to hurt. ‘He works at a lot of sites… Just because this one matches the pipe metal Beverly found… It could just be a coincidence…’

_She looks just like them. Same hair, same eyes, same weight, same height… All of them, Omegas. Haven’t his eyes been straying? Haven’t they been on eight conveniently timed hunting trips…?_

It can’t be real. He doesn’t _want_ it to be real…

And then he hears it. Abigail is crying, begging Garret to stop. Begging her _father_ not to hurt her. High-pitched mewls, broken whimpers… All Omegan sounds designed to trigger an Alpha’s biological instinct to protect.

Will has his hunting knife in his hand before he even _thinks_ to reach for his gun, the bone handle cold against the heat of his palm. Sweat darkens his armpits and the collar of his shirt. His eyes itch as they blaze with gold fury, and the same hormones giving Garret his strength and speed are matched in Will.

He will do _anything_ to protect his child.

‘I had to!’ Garret gasps, the moment he sees Will enter the room. He has Abi in his arms, holding her back against his chest, his own curved blade at her throat. And Abi, Will’s sweet little girl, his only child, is crying, her cheeks blotchy and her eyes golden as she shudders with fear.

‘Dad…’

‘Let her go,’ Will snarls, extending a hand to draw Garret’s attention from their daughter’s neck. ‘Abi, it’s okay, sweetie… _Garret_ , please… It’s _me_.’

‘I _had_ to!’ Garret repeats, and time slows. Will can _see_ the bunching of his muscles, the ripple of tension as he strikes. He sees the moment his Alpha decides to kill their baby, and his own choice is made for him.

‘NO!’

He lunges forward, just as Garret’s blade sinks into Abi’s throat. Her flesh parts and a great gout of blood sprays from the artery, misting in the air, steaming as it jets from her body to splatter the walls and ceiling.

_How can one person lose so much blood?_

Will crashes into Garret, shoving him away from their daughter and slamming him into the cabinets. Abi chokes, scrabbling for the gash in her neck, wild eyed and panicked. She drops to the floor, convulsing in shock, a sea of crimson spreading across the tiles around her.

_I’ll make it stop…_

‘I had to!’ Garret’s voice is rough with Rut; his scent glands have swollen and his eyes blaze scarlet. He scrabbles to get his knife up, baring his teeth at his mate, but Will is too far gone. An odd silence fills him, deafening him to everything else. All he wants to do is rip Garret’s heart from his chest, and cradle his daughter in his arms until she is healed.

He wrestles with the Alpha, snapping at his face, his throat, stabbing at him with his knife. Garret gets a punch in, connecting with Will’s cheek and splitting the skin across the bone, but Will barely feels it. He can tell when the other man goes for the nape of his neck, trying to use his crest to paralyze him, and the _rage_ that spills from his veins is an avalanche.

‘STOP!’ he screams, and rams his knife into Garret’s chest. The blade sinks between the Alpha’s ribs, catching on muscle before piercing a lung. Garret howls in pain, arching away from the wound, drowning in copper just like his daughter, and Will sees his chance. He locks his teeth into the muscle of his Alpha’s cheek and bites down, hard, drooling as flesh fills his mouth.

‘See?!’ Garret is flailing now, terrified of his Omega’s attack. Will can hear his own snarls, low and vicious, and he revels in them. He shakes his head, tearing a great chunk of flesh from his Alpha’s face, gulping it down without a thought. He twists the knife, distracting Garret from the hole above his jaw, and then bites out his throat.

_I’ll make it stop._

The burst of _heat_ across his tongue, the spray of blood in his eyes… Will doesn’t notice any of it. His canines rip through the stubbled skin over Garret’s windpipe, crushing cartilage as he grinds his molars together. He hears the hiss of air and the gurgled cry of a dying man, and then –

‘Will? _Will_ …?’

Jack snaps his fingers under the Omega’s nose, startling him from whatever reconstruction he’s trapped in. Will flinches, the gold in his eyes flaring bright before shrinking to circle the edges of his irises, leaving them a stormy blue.

‘Wh-what? Sorry… I…’ He wipes sweaty palms on his trousers, eyes skating around the lab before he grounds himself in the patterns of tree bark. ‘What was I saying?’

‘Nothing,’ Zeller says, scowling at him. ‘ _We_ were discussing what _we_ found in the water found in the vic’s lungs. He was _drowned_ , and kept in water up to his thighs for forty-eight to seventy-two hours.’

‘Right…’ Will takes a step closer to the display, and Jimmy gives him a sympathetic pat on the arm before drawing his attention to the microscope display screen.

‘It’s good news, though,’ he says, pointing to magnified cells. ‘See here? These are diatoms. Unicellular colonies. Good as _fingerprints_. No two water sources have the same diatom population.’

Will’s crest twinges and he reaches up to rub it, hating the way his shirt collar rubs the sensitive skin.

_I bit you hard…_

His fingers come away bloody –

‘So, water in the lungs give us location of death,’ Jack confirms, wrenching Will from the memory. ‘Show me.’

‘Here.’ Jimmy grins and brings up a map of the local area around Richmond. ‘In a fifty-mile radius.’

Jack nods and turns to Will.

‘You up for a drive?’

***

Snow crunches underfoot, but Will smells the sweet decay of rotting leaves, still fresh as Fall bleeds into winter. It’s just him and Jack, following what is probably another dead end; an abandoned cabin in the woods, the only suspicious thing about it being the new padlock and chain securing a rusted gate. No reason to get the local police involved; no reason to bring Forensics with them, yet.

If they find something, they can handle themselves.

_I bit you hard…_

Giving his head a sharp shake, Will follows Jack from the car, fire chasing ice up his spine, radiating daggers of pain out through his crest until his temples throb in time to his pulse. He wants Hannibal; wants his Alpha’s scent and presence and safety…

_Garret proposed to me at this cabin…_

He squints, trying to discern if this _is_ Garret’s old hunting lodge, or somewhere else. He can feel himself slipping; his brain boiling, dribbling from his ears, just as surely as warm water trickles down the windscreen of the SUV…

_I don’t know who I am, anymore._

Jack picks the lock on the front door and steps inside, his gun up, torch splintering the gloom. Cobwebs break like gossamer strings, floating up and away into the shadows of the eaves. Will grips tight to his hunting knife, the familiar scent of damp wood, mouse droppings and _death_ making his stomach turn.

‘Building’s been condemned for years,’ Jack murmurs, eyes sharp as he studies the immediate area, always alert for threats. ‘Perfect place for the Ripper to do his work.’

‘Maybe.’ Will crouches, hovering his fingertips over the thick layer of dust on the floor. ‘But not recently.’

‘There’s a back entrance,’ Jack explains, nodding towards another door. ‘And stairs… Look at the railing.’

Will frowns, his eyes prickling gold when he sees the unmistakable smear of a handprint in the dirt. Someone gripped the bannister on their way down…

‘The Ripper’s more careful than this, Jack,’ he mutters, scowling as he follows the footsteps into the cabin basement. ‘He wouldn’t be so obvious, not unless he _wanted_ you to find something.’

_Just like we found Cassie Boyle… The “field kabuki” that led me straight to Garret… Made me think like the killer, so I could find him. So I could stop him._

He descends the bottom step and –

He’s in Hannibal’s office. It’s a memory, repressed but not forgotten. A fire crackles in the hearth, golden light bouncing off the honeyed whiskey in each of their tumblers… Their edges blur, eaten by darkness, but Will can see Hannibal’s face with screaming clarity; so rapt, his eyes sparking like blood-soaked obsidians.

‘Night terrors typically present as a response to extreme stress,’ Hannibal says, his voice echoing through Will’s subconscious. ‘Unable to manifest in the conscious mind, they seek an outlet during sleep.’

‘I’m having nightmares about killing my Alpha,’ Will whispers, but he knows that’s not what he said at the time. He just can’t remember what he _did_ say. This conversation is important, but he doesn’t know why. ‘I tore his throat out, and then you bonded me…’

Hannibal’s eyes glow, and he wets his lips. He sits forwards, snaring Will with the movement, luring him ever deeper into his abyss.

_What aren’t you telling me, Hannibal? What have you done?_

‘What did it feel like?’

Will shivers at the question. His eyes flood gold and his crest throbs in time to his pulse. He stares at Hannibal, at the rival Alpha Courting him behind his current mate’s back, at the man he’s known for less than a month, but someone so _familiar_ it’s jarring.

_I do know you. I’ve known you for years…_

‘The Chesapeake Ripper kills in sounders of three.’

His voice rings out across the lecture hall, and Will paces back and forth behind his desk, clicking through images on the projector above him.

‘He did his first victims in nine days. Annapolis, Essex, Baltimore…’

It’s another memory; sharper than the first but even more surreal. Abigail and Garret are in the front row, Garret’s skin mottled with decay, his throat gaping and cheek missing. Abi, his precious baby girl, is pale, her slit throat still dribbling blood…

And, in the doorway, Hannibal is watching him. Dressed in the same suit he’d first seen him in; plaid silk, striped shirt, paisley tie… A clash of patterns that draw the eye like a peacock. Regal and poised, he is everything Will loves about him. Strong and sure, focused and determined.

_You’d do anything to get what you want._

‘Will?’

A rough hand grips his shoulder, shaking him, and Will rounds on Jack with a snarl, bringing the knife up to defend himself. Jack backs away, holding his hands up to show he means no harm. Will’s fist is clenched tight around nothing, his knuckles bloodless even as he bruises his palms.

‘Easy,’ he says, regret seeping into every pore of his being as he considers the broken man before him. ‘Easy, Will. You still with me?’

‘I…’ Will sways, dizziness rising to swallow him whole as the last piece of the puzzle clicks into place, as sudden and _true_ as the strike of lightning.

_You did this to me._

He swings wild eyes around the cellar, noting the water tanks, the jars of congealing blood… The cut flowers, withering to nothing amidst surgical tools… The stolen stag’s head and antlers sprouting from the walls. It’s not the basement of an abandoned cabin but Garret’s hunting attic, his trophy room, a thicket crowding in on him…

_You showed me the negative, so I could see the positive. You were curious what I would do… You’ve been following me for years, just as I’ve been following you… And then, when I confronted you…_

Will falls to his knees, pain slicing through the top of his skull. He clutches his head, unable to keep from crying out. It’s an avalanche; a bursting dam, slow at first but coming faster and faster, breaking down his defenses and shattering him with the truth.

_You did this to me._

‘H- _Hannibal_ ,’ he gasps, his vision collapsing in on itself, drowning him in darkness. He claws at his face, at the tears stinging his cheeks, and rocks his forehead down to the floor, praying for it to stop. To just _stop_ , please.

_How many times have you made me forget?_

‘ _Hannibal_ … Jack… Jack, I need Hannibal…’

_I don’t ever want to need him again._

Through the screams, Will hears Jack calling the scene in. Requesting officers and an ambulance… He remembers… There was an ambulance that day in Minnesota… Was it for him, or Abigail?

_It shouldn’t be so pretty. It shouldn’t be so peaceful._

‘Garret! Abigail!’

Will bursts through the front door of his house, the home he’s had with his Alpha since he was sixteen. Garret is working himself into a frenzy, but he’s not alone. Abigail is here. Their sweet girl… Their Omega…

‘GARRET! NO!’

Hannibal’s eyes glow like hot coals in the darkness of his study, and he presses Will’s hunting knife into his hands.

‘What did it feel like?’ he asks, his voice everywhere and nowhere, darkness seeping past every fort and barrier in Will’s mind, staining the very core of him. ‘When you dreamed you killed Garret?’

Will stares at the photographs of missing girls… Missing Omegas… Missing daughters and sisters…

‘They look just like Abi,’ he whispers, choking on fear. Choking on flesh torn from his Alpha’s face. Blood blinds him, spraying too fast to avoid. It’s everywhere; the cabinets, the floor, even the walls.

_How can one person lose so much blood?_

‘It felt terrible,’ he confesses, glancing up from his whiskey tumbler, drowning in Hannibal’s gaze, which draws the truth from his mind like poison. Garret’s hunting trips… Garret’s insistence at Abigail going to college orientation… Garret’s eyes, lingering in places they shouldn’t. ‘And then… It felt powerful.’

_I bit you hard._

The world burns, and Will burns with it. He shatters, ripped into a thousand splintered fragments.

_Garret’s dead. I killed him. And I’m dying with him._

Hannibal grabs Will’s face and stares down into his eyes. Grips his chin hard enough to bruise, eyes blazing crimson and forehead speckled with blood.

‘Stay with me!’ he cries. Orders. Demands. _Begs_. ‘Will! Stay with me!’

_Don’t you want to feel powerful?_

Hannibal pulls the whiskey from Will’s hand and crouches before him. His palms are stained with blood – _Abi’s_ blood – and he’s haggard; exhausted and frightened and so, _so_ worried, and –

He smiles, and Will sees the demon inside him, the dark beast slumbering behind milky eyes.

‘Then you know what you need to do.’

***

Waking is painful.

Will’s shift to consciousness is slow; a subtle bleeding from nightmare to reality. He groans as he comes to, his head in a vice and body aching. He can’t move; there’s an unusual pressure at his nape and it’s only after he blinks, his eyelids slow to respond to the command, that he realizes he’s wearing a crest brace.

‘Han’bal?’

At his Omega’s croak, Hannibal looks up from his notebook. The pages are filled with mathematical equations, each more desperate than the last, an endless desire to turn back time and try again.

‘Hello, Will.’

Hannibal’s voice is soft and warm, and Will relaxes at the sound of it. The familiarity.

_Perfectly conditioned._

He wets his lips, swallows, and stares up at the ceiling above him. They are in their bedroom, in the townhouse.

‘It’s 7.22pm,’ Hannibal says, following the routine to the second. ‘We’re in Baltimore, Maryland.’

‘My name is Will Graham,’ Will finishes, tears swimming in his eyes. ‘I…’ He pauses, unable to tense because of the clamp on his crest, the metal brace flooding his body with natural sedatives. ‘I killed my Alpha, Garret Jacob Hobbs…’

‘After he murdered your daughter, Abigail.’ Hannibal sets his book aside, curious as to Will’s progress this time.

‘You bonded me,’ Will whispers, feeding the lines out into the air between them as he has so many times before. Their script… Their lie. ‘After beating Garret for the right to claim me.’

‘He became enraged,’ Hannibal says, sitting forwards, sharp eyes fixed on Will’s face. ‘He attacked Abigail.’

‘She didn’t survive.’ Will’s voice falters and he clamps his lips around a keening sound of distress. Closes his eyes and lets two tears slip down his cheeks, the only indication of his agony. ‘You…’ He tries to swallow. Tries to speak. ‘You…’

‘Yes?’ Hannibal’s eyes flicker red, his palms tingling with adrenaline. ‘What comes next, Will?’

‘You saved me.’ Will glares at him through wet lashes. ‘You said you saved me.’

‘And I did.’ Hannibal purrs, just once, a low sound of praise. Will feels the fine hairs rise across his arms, and it is only the brace that keeps him from shuddering.

‘You killed Cassie Boyle,’ he growls, pouring all of his hatred, his _contempt_ , into his glare. ‘You staged her body so I’d _know_ Garret killed the others… You sent me after him…’

Hannibal’s lips part. His eyes gleam and he leans closer.

‘Go on.’

Will wants to sob, wants to turn away and cry, but all that makes it past bloodshot eyes are two tears. One for a mate, and one for a daughter.

‘You let Abigail die,’ he whispers. ‘You manipulated me… Made me forget what I know about you, _dozens_ of times…’

Hannibal’s breath catches, and his heart stills in his chest. This is the moment he’s been waiting for… The moment they _always_ wait for.

 ‘And what do you think you know, Will?’

Will swallows, desperate to make it stop, to make it go away, to change the course of his fate and be that boy again, be that naïve little Omega, unbonded and unbroken…

But he can’t. He can only stare calmly into his new Alpha’s face, into the face of the demon that plucked him from obscurity and broke open his mind, just to see what would happen.

‘You’re the Chesapeake Ripper.’

 


End file.
